Marines Advance to Class A Semifinals

The Long Beach boys’ lacrosse played strong ball-control offense against Hicksville in the Class A quarterfinals at Hofstra Monday, winning a game of endurance and pulling away in the fourth en route to a 12-8 victory.

The win, paced by Joseph Radin (5 goals) and Connor Sofield (3 goals, 1 assist), earned the Marines a rematch against Farmingdale in the semis.

On defense, the game was won through the resilience of goalie Mike Rourke, and a target defense that focused on stopping Hicksville’s two main scoring weapons: Joe Leonard and Sal Geneva. “We played a special defense to stop them,” said coach Jim Kaspar.

The strategy worked. Hicksville, averaging 14-15 goals per game during the regular season, was held to single digits.

Long Beach came out of the box slow, scoreless in the first and spotting Hicksville two before getting untracked in the second quarter.

But the Marines offense dominated possession time throughout, and at 7:05 it paid off when Jake Shapiro scored the first of five unanswered goals for Long Beach.

In the rough and tumble of ground ball scrimmaging in front of their net, Hicksville’s zone defense became porous, and alternating goals for Radin and Sofield pushed it to 5-2 with 3:43. Swapped goals with under a minute in the half made it 6-3.

The third quarter played like the first, a holding game in which Long Beach was outscored 2-1, posting its only point at 2:16 when Matt Sheehan came up with a ground ball at midfield and found a streaking Joe Radin for a fast break goal.

But in the fourth quarter the dam broke open for Long Beach. Sofield found Thomas Hamlet for a quick one at 11:06, and scored less than a minute later on a rebound. James Forkin was next, keeping his momentum despite taking a stick to the head and slamming home an unassisted goal at 9:57.

Hicksville responded in a man-up situation at 9:08, but the Marines showed they were not inclined to let the margin slip away when Radin, on a clean fast break, flipped a shot over his right shoulder and into the net at 5:09.

From that point on, it was a matter of working the clock and maintaining offensive pressure for Long Beach. Hicksville scored twice, but Jake Shapiro drove the final nail in it at 3:32, taking an assist from Sheehan in a man up situation for the Marines’ final goal of the day.

Long Beach takes on No. 1 seed Farmingdale Wednesday at 3:30 p.m. at Hofstra.